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Saturday, October 25, 2008

Hurray! We aren't homeless anymore! It's very disorienting to be without a home and not knowing when you'll get one. We went to the housing office on Wed and the housing gods smiled upon us! Smiled! 1000 watts worth of smile! We got a house that day-almost unheard of. And it's awesome! Awe-some. Most housing in Germany is apartments, and that's what we're in. It's on the 3rd floor (Walk-up people! Buns of steel here I come!), has 3 bedrooms, 1 bath (big bath), a large kitchen, with tons of cabinets and counter space(woot-woot) and a HUGE living/dining room. Two of the bedrooms are really large, which is fantastic. The master is roughly 17x16 and the second is roughly 14x16. The smallest bedroom is about 12x16. It has parquet floors throughout, except the kitchen and bath, which are ceramic tile. The only really downside (and this is a biggie) is that there is no washer and dryer in the apartment. They are in the basement. Four flights down! Holy guacamole! Can you imagine hauling laundry up and down 4 flights of stairs? I'm thinking about making M and Indy wear their clothes twice before washing. Not me, of course, because, ewww....but they're boys. They won't care. Oh, oh! Want to know what the coolest part about it is? Okay, maybe YOU won't think it's cool, but I do. We can see the General's house from our windows. When I say the General, I mean THE top General in Europe. 4 stars. He lives in a big house behind an even bigger wall and guarded (with armed soldiers 24/7). You cannot get near this place. He also has a fleet of cars that they change to plates on frequently. Several of the generals have been targeted int he past, and one was even car bombed (he lived though), hence the multiple cars and plates. Scary, huh? So anyway, we can see over the wall! The house IS huge. Wowzers. I'm thinking about taking some pics, but I'm kind of afraid the guards will see me and come banging on the door. I will be taking some pics of the house in the next few days, so check back!

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

We arrived in Germany yesterday! I'm deleriously tired. Seriously. I'm exhausted. M and I did not sleep at all on the planes. I tried, but it just wasn't happening. Indy slept about 7 hours of the long flight, so he was good to go the moment he stepped off the plane. M and I were ready to drop. Until we found out our dogs were missing. Then we were wide awake. Oh, yes, missing dogs. I remained relatively calm (mostly because I was too tired to be crazy) because I knew they had made it on the plane, so I knew they were somewhere. It took 3 very long hours to find them. My poor babies. They had been in their crates for 21 hours by the time we got them again. Talk about having to pee! I took them outside (once we got through Customs and Vet services) and they pee'd for like 5 solid minutes. They were so happy to be out of their crates! I think if Dutch could have, he's have gladly pushed his crate out into traffic so he'd never have to see it again.Germany, is....well, prety much the same. It's chilly and drizzly. Kind of like it always is. It's so lovely though. When we were driving down the A5 Indy saw a couple of real castles up on the mountains and absolutely squealed with delight. That's my boy! He was so excited. He is handling the 9 hour time change far better than M and I are. He's a trooper. M and I are ready to drop. Yea jet lag! So not. I'll catch up more (and post some pics) after I've slept. Tchuss!

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

I'm sitting in the Denver USO right now in a big, comfy, leather recliner. Bless the USO!!!!!! There are at least 20 theatre seat recliners, HUGE flat screen TV's, tables and chairs, a sleeping room (I wish!), computers, video games and free food and drinks. OMG, do I love the USO. They are a fantastic organization and a welcome place in a cold airport. If you are looking for a worthy organization to donate to, please consider the USO. They are completely funded by donations. Please click the banner below to donate.

Anyhoodles, our flight from Tucson to Denver was.....interesting. We sat in row 12. It was the last row of the plane. I thought they were going to have to pull some sort of rip cord to get us going. We also encountered a lot of turbulance. I hate turbulance! Hate it. M took some pics, but I haven't got the faintest idea where the connecter cable is. Boo. We arrived at a very chilly Denver (I know this because we had to walk from the plane to the terminal because it was too small to pull up to a gate!) and headed straight to the USO to wait out our 5.5 hour layover. Wheeeeeeeee! Aren't you jealous? In about an hour we will be boarding our next flight to Frankfurt. A 10 hour flight. I may drink. Heavily. I'll check in when I get to the other side of the pond, as it were.

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

OMG, this move is never going to end! We had packers in our house Wed, Thurs, and Fri last week. They are loading tomorrow. All the boxes are making me nuts. It's all too brown. Can you imagine looking at this all day for a week??????? I want to pull stuff out and put it away. I want my pretty house back!

Dutch and Arf are not letting the move interrupt their napping.

One week from today I'll be sipping (free) alcoholic beverages and watching a movie I've probably already seen as we cross the Atlantic. Oh, Lufthansa, how I adore thee. Bring on the drinks!

Friday, October 3, 2008

Isn't she lovely? She doesn't have a name yet, but we don't know each other very well. I already love her though.

Why did my sweet man buy her for me? Well, years (and years) ago I had an old school Canon Rebel (you know, the kind that used FILM). Her name was Leona. One night, way back when I was in college (again, back in the old days when no one had a laptop), I had a HUGE report due on something that I'm sure I didn't care about and had spent a long boring afternoon at the library. I love libraries, don't get me wrong, but this was something I was clearly not interested in. Anyway, I brought home a stack of books from the library (pre-internet we actually had to look stuff up in books!) . that I had to cart in from my car. Leona was in her case behind the driver's seat. My hands were too full to carry her, so I left her, planning to come back for her. I got into my room, plopped my books down and my phone rang (corded! man, I'm old), and it was a boy! A boy I liked. A lot. He was so good looking it was almost sinful. Too bad he later turned out to be a jerk. Isn't that always the way? After about a 2 hour conversation (lots of flirting) I got busy working on my paper, and forgot all about poor sweet Leona.

That night, half the cars in the lot were broken into including mine. They broke my window, swiped my radio AND Leona (she was in her case with the 3 extra lenses I had for her). I was heartbroken. Leona and I had spent many hours together, photographing interesting stuff and occasionally getting high off the processing chemicals. Man, I love the smell of b&w developing chemicals.

Leona was never replaced and for years and years, I bemoaned the lack of a really good camera. So many beautiful photos passed me by with my little point and shoot. I could have replaced her, but didn't want to spend the money. See, if it had been (I shudder to even type this) shoes (OMG, can you imagine?) or a handbag, I would have replaced it immediately (after wearing black for a few weeks to mourn my loss of course), but electronics? Not so much.

M knew how badly I wanted a new camera. I mean really, how could he not? What with the drooling and sad longing looks and deep heaving sighs every time we passed a camera store. Queen of subtlety. That is me. He's been saving up (bless his heart) and finally had enough to buy me my lovely new toy. Wasn't that crazy sweet of him? Sometimes he amazes me.

Once I figure out how to use her (the manual is thicker than some textbooks I've seen), and we've gotten to know each other, be on the look out for some awesome pics.